


here on the eve of too long

by thelabours



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Akaashi is an Immortal, Alternate Universe- Immortality, Brief Mentions of Blood, God!Kuroo, brief mentions of ww2, vague as heck, your faves are dead i am sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-25
Updated: 2017-06-26
Packaged: 2018-11-18 23:02:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11300649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelabours/pseuds/thelabours
Summary: In the end, all was left were his memories, and his books, lying untouched under cobwebs and layers of dust. He wants to forget but he also wants to remember them, pinprick lighthouses in the sea of time.So he remembers.He remembers every single one.





	1. when orange is complementary to blue

_**BOOK I** _  
_1767, Rural Japan._

When Keiji finally regains consciousness, he is staring directly into orange eyes.

The owner shifts away the next moment and Keiji takes a minute to assess his surroundings. He is in the middle of a field, in the middle of attention, and a headache blooms painfully in the middle of his forehead.

He stands up dizzily and hears someone shout. He vaguely registers someone holding his arm, an amber halo before him, dragging him along the dusty road.

He is taken to a small cottage and he falls asleep on the tiny bed next to the fireplace.

Keiji wakes to find peachy sunlight crawling away from him, the scarlet flames of the fireplace low, a silhouette of a man, no, a _boy_ , before it, staring deep into the burning coals, as if looking for answers. He turns;

“Oh, good, you are awake! Who are you, and where are you from?” the boy asks, curiosity laced in his voice.

“I…My name is Akaashi Keiji.” Keiji does not want to reveal his secret immortality, so he asks: “Who are you? How did I get here?”

The boy answers, “I brought you here, you were lying dazed in the field and I thought, perhaps, you might not like the way people might stare.” The boy looks on inquisitively, before adding, “I am Hinata Shouyou. I work as a labourer at the field you were in. Why were you there? I haven’t seen you here before!”

Keiji wants to object, the boy is just that: a boy. He has no right working to the death in a field when he should be studying. Almost as if Hinata knows Keiji’s thoughts, he says quietly (a contrast to his looks, bold as they are), “I have no family…my parents died in a fire. I earn for myself and my sister, she lives with my aunt.”

They sit in silence for a while, and Hinata begins to fidget. “Where are you from, Akaashi-san?” 

“Far away,” is a hastily thought answer. Dodging questions is second nature to him now. Almost wordlessly, they agree Keiji live with Hinata, so people do not question why a young boy lives alone, to cook and clean for him, while he pays Hinata back for his hospitality. 

Hinata, Keiji learns, is a lively soul. An absolute joy to be around. His eyes light up with the kindest fires and his determination to work hard every day makes Keiji both angry and proud. His favourite thing about living here is, Hinata can tell _stories._

The boy has a way with words, extracting characters and anecdotes from his throat, pulling in Keiji’s attention like the moon pulls tides. His voice dripping with emotion and Keiji listens with bated breath.

Every day, after toil, Hinata would come home, his body world-weary but his mind teeming with ideas, a girl who can talk to birds, a lion who can grow fifty meters and eats shiitake mushrooms, an old man who was God—all stories Keiji has listened to, over a dinner of stale bread, hot green tea, and bland stew.

“Your stories are captivating,” Keiji tells him once as they prepare for the night.

Hinata startles, and thanks him, bowing low.

“When I was younger…I didn’t like studying and reading much. But now, since I don’t get to, I think I’ve realised the gravity of an education. These stories are from books I wish I’d cherished longer in my childhood.”

In that moment Keiji learnt one of the first lessons from Hinata—learning. An integral element of boyhood, lost. Hinata had turned away from a sky full of stars to navigate his way to the deepest, most fantastic recesses of his mind.

They look at the stars, and somehow, Keiji points out the constellations, and Hinata makes up myths about them.

The next day, Hinata does not come home. Instead, two men from the landlord’s come, recognisable by their robes. 

Without fanfare, they say, “Hinata Shouyou is dead.”

They might as well have said, “Akaashi Keiji has no reason to live, henceforth.”

Later, when he sees Hinata’s body, cradling his head, blood dripping from the corners of his mouth, pressure builds in Keiji’s ears and tears map their way to the bottom of his chin, dropping off one by one by one.

He can feel exactly when the wings that once flew him, carefully engineered with metal and wax, melt into despair and plunge him into the cold, deep sea.

The guards leave him to Hinata’s body and Keiji kneels there, a young body in his arms.

Hours later, a God finds him like that—blood-stained hands and sorrowful heart.

“Did you love him?” Kuroo asks, as they carry the body to the temple.

Keiji feels his throat constrict.

“He was my best friend. I loved him like a son.”

Kuroo watches with interest, it is not often Keiji shows emotion.

Keiji finishes the last of his notebook, and names it after the constellation _Reticulum._

He takes a last look at the sanguine clouds giving in to inky black, the stars lighting up dimly, and disappears.

 

* * *

 

Tragedy finds him in one of her rooms soon after.

Akaashi refuses to talk about it.

She wonders if he blames her. It doesn't matter either way.


	2. we hold our breaths to prove we can go without

**_BOOK II_ **  
_1872, Outskirts of Kyoto._

 

“You know, I’ve always regretted that I didn’t get to see what lay beyond the skies.” Yamaguchi’s wistful voice carries in the tiny house.

Keiji’s brows pull together. He knows what lies beyond the greys and blues of the evening sky, a palace of gods and goddesses with arms stretched out wide to welcome him home and thin smiles stretched out wide to cover up their anguish.

He waits.

“I mean, I know it’s the universe, vast and endless, but I want to see it! I’ve always looked up at the stars, an amateur astronomer at best, and thought to myself ‘did I make the right choice?’ I could’ve been studying stars but instead, all I do is write about them and l...”

Yamaguchi stops, popping his head out of the kitchen, stirring the pot of tea, a litany of self-doubt at his lips. Keiji can tell so after years of friendship.

Keiji sniffs the air and smiles lightly, green tea reminds him of a hundred years ago.

From what he knows of western culture from Tragedy, draws comparisons between Yamaguchi at the window, looking up at the fading lights, stirring tea in the tiny pot, an angel without wings he says, “Tadashi, you’re doing the right thing. It makes you happy, and for that I am glad.”

Yamaguchi turns and for a second nothing transpires; Yamaguchi laughs, a chiming sound, birds twittering at dawn.

“I’m so happy I have you in my life. Your conviction and faith in me is ridiculous.” He is shaking his head.

It echoes words uttered long ago: “I’m glad I met you.”

They drink their tea while Keiji sits on the stool and Yamaguchi throws himself on the bed, as he reads his poetry out loud to his friend, the twilight casting dark silhouettes on the mattress, a muted foreshadowing.

Two weeks and an accident on the staircase later, Keiji can still taste the strong tea on his tongue, mixed with bitter loneliness he can’t swallow when he sees Yamaguchi’s body. Not quite his body, but his soul, drifting among identical others but distinctly special to Keiji. 

“You can’t save him.” A God materialises beside him.

“I know. I’m not here to save him.” Keiji wishes Kuroo wouldn’t patronise him.

They stand side by side, quiet as shadows, watching over the plain of drifting souls.

“Did you love him?”

Keiji feels a lump in his throat. He feels his heart clench.

“He was my best friend. I loved him like a brother.”

Kuroo is silent, watching with curious eyes. It is not often Keiji shows emotion.

Yamaguchi’s book gets published, an anonymous friend delivers the manuscripts to the publishing house, late one night. A dream Yamaguchi was never able to fulfil by himself.

Ukai-san, the chief editor goes through the poems one by one— _flowers of antimony, fool’s gold, lunar caustic, aqua regia_ ; the chapbook is printed with the dedication turned epigraph: 

“To Akaashi Keiji, a friend whose existence is a metaphor for believing in myself.”

He rips the page from his copy of the book and glues it in his notebook and writes:

“There is no existence without a friend like you.”

He shuts the notebook and names it.

Keiji disappears after that.

* * *

Kuroo knows better than to open the door without warning. Instead, he knocks a tune onto the door.

The staccato rhythm bounces off the stucco walls with ease. Kuroo waits for the doors to open.

"What is it? I don't have much time." In the face of Tragedy, Kuroo could do nothing but oblige. It was just as well. What he is going to ask...is not his place to ask. But he _must_.

"My Lady." He bows low.

"Yes."

"It's about Akaashi Keiji." Tragedy's eyes soften imperceptibly.

"What of him?"

"Is it..." For the first time, Kuroo questions their righteousness of what they do, and how Gods conduct this cosmos, "is it _right_?"

Her shoulders drop and for a moment, Kuroo can see the millennia line her eyes and the centuries that crown her brow. It shakes his bones from within.

"And if it isn't? What better way is there?"

Kuroo doesn't have an answer. So he bows low.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shout out to vi (nvt) for being the best beta reader, without you, this wouldn't have seen the light of day.
> 
> to sushi (@idksush) for her inspiring poetry.
> 
> to simran (@father-egg) for being okay with dead characters, and encouraging me to write whenever i feel like a shit author.
> 
> without you, this fic wouldn't be a thing.


	3. ghosts haunt you inside out

**_BOOK III_ **  
_1946, University of Tohoku._

“I’m so glad you came by, Keiji-kun, you really have saved my life.”

“It’s quite alright, Yui-san,” Keiji replies, slightly amused. Michimiya was quite prone to melodramatic instances, and they never failed to entertain Keiji. After all, he had only offered to help Michimiya correct some essays, and she was overwhelmed and overworked as it is. 

(Keiji had offered his services out of sheer experience with poetry and literature for well over a century, but Michimiya needn’t know that). She makes them green tea while Keiji makes himself comfortable in her cosy office. 

Michimiya certainly was a memorable character, Keiji often wondered why she wouldn’t write a book, when every single time he met her, she would drill knowledge about some-or-the-other literary work into his head, her admonishing him with the idea of preferring to analyse and dissect rather than narrate her own tales.

“—don’t know, perhaps I’m not well suited for this job after all,” she laughs, clearing away her desks of some books—a treasure trove of Hemmingway, Soseki, and Shakespeare—and pulling Keiji out of his thoughts.

“Why would you think that,” his eyebrow is raised but his voice is not. Keiji is aware Michimiya blames herself for a great many things: her students’ grades, her failing marriage, her best friend’s deteriorating health, but Keiji is also acutely aware of the fact that Michimiya is strong. Not quite like anyone else he’s met before. 

But the war has not been kind to any of them. They settle down to look over essays.

Keiji will remember these thoughts the next morning, a frantic phone call later.

* * *

Keiji is done crying.

All he can think of is blood. All he can _see_ is blood.

So _much_ of it.

Objectively, every human body averages blood content at five litres.

The blood in car— on the grass, on the tree, splattered across the windshield, crimson on the burgundy seats and the pink plush doll hanging from the rear-view mirror—it didn’t look like five litres.

It looked like a sea of red, ominous and…

_Tragic._

A bell tolls faintly, the university is absolutely ancient, Keiji knows. He’s been here quite a few times in his immortal life. And every time has ended with death. He wonders briefly, dispassionately when his own would arrive.

He hears one of the professors ask (what was her name? Did it even matter?), “was it an accident?”

Another replies, “the police say they don’t know. But for now, they can’t tell if it was intentional or not."

Keiji’s breath comes out in quick bursts. 

The deceased, Michimiya Yui, whose features were faintly discernible amongst shattered glass and cuts and bruises, had been one of Keiji’s favourite people. He had loved few as he loved Michimiya.

He waits until the crowd disperses, but he finds the body gone. 

He sighs a heavy sigh and rubs his eyes harshly.

 _Immortality didn’t guarantee happiness_ , Tragedy had warned.

He slips unnoticed into Michimiya’s office one last time, picking up and thumbing through her favourite copy of Yamaguchi’s poems, gifted to her two birthdays ago. Ink-smudged fingerprints line the edges of the paper and Keiji’s tears weave down his face quietly. He couldn't read Michimiya's annotations even if he tried.

He doesn’t make a sound when a God manifests next to him.

They stand quietly in the office, the late afternoon sunlight streaming through the windows, illuminating the mess at the table. Crumpled papers, chewed pencils, and half drunk cups of green tea.

“Did you love her?” The God questions.

With a mouthful of sorrows, Keiji answers softly, “of course. I loved her more than anyone in this lifetime. I loved her like a sister.”

Kuroo looks at him seriously with dark, dark eyes. It isn’t often Keiji cries with such emotion.

The greeting on the front page of the book (Yui-san, Happy Birthday. I hope you enjoy this book of poems. The author is little-known, but I personally love these. Yours, Keiji.) is torn out and stuck into Keiji’s books along with the words:

_I wish you had stayed._

Keiji disappears after that.

* * *

"Why me?" Keiji asks Tragedy one afternoon, over tea. He always asks for green tea and Tragedy obliges. There is only so much she can grant him.

"Why not? You're not special."

Keiji takes solace in her words.

"I'm old," she remarks.

Keiji nods. She has lived several eons before his time.

He asks, "are you like the others? Like Kuroo and Konoha?"

They sip tea. Wind sprites work just outside the window. Sunlight draws with their shadows on the stucco walls.

"Does it matter? Gods are immortals, too."

"Why are we different, then?"

She thinks over his question carefully.

"We cannot die," she answers finally. She puts on her halo and bids him goodbye. There is work to be done.

Keiji nods without understanding fully. He wonders if she has felt her throat rubbed raw from screaming in the cemetery. If she has felt numbness where her heart used to be. If her years have blinded her to solidarity. If her bones are heavy, too.

A few days later, he receives a letter. Unsigned, but he can tell it's from her. Details of the aftermath of the war.

The leftover hurt curls itself and sinks into the curve of his neck.


End file.
